Interrupted Life: Incarcerated Mothers in the United States

Abstract

The anti-prison movement in the United States is a growing activist front, partly because the numbers are so shocking and getting worse. It's hard to avoid beginning with the numbers for just that reason. For example, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, in 2001, there were 470 inmates for every 100,000 U.S. residents. Four years later, despite the surge of activism, in 2005, there were 488 inmates per 100,000 residents. Nationally there are now more than eight times as many women incarcerated in state and federal prisons and local jails than there were in 1980. That means there are approximately 200,000 incarcerated women in the United States. But if you count all forms of correctional supervision probation, parole, jail, and state and federal prison, more than one million women are now behind bars or under the control of the criminal justice system. Recently, the Real Cost of Prisons Project (RCPP) reported, "one out of every 109 women in America is incarcerated, on parole or probation." RCPP provides more numbers, figures showing us that incarceration in America is about race. These numbers are stunning and determinative: While African Americans make up 13% of the population, and 13% of the drug users in the United States, 35% of people arrested for drug-related crimes are African Americans, 55% of people convicted for drug-related